Why do we feel a surge of compassion for one person’s story — yet stay emotionally flat when thousands are suffering? In this episode of Circuit Breaker: Rewiring Your Decisions, we unpack the identifiable victim effect — our tendency to respond more strongly to a single, vivid individual than to an entire group.

Explore why statistics leave us cold, how our brains are wired to care about people rather than numbers, and how recognising this pattern helps you understand why one story can move you to act when large‑scale problems barely register.

Studies and links:

The ‘‘Identified Victim’’ Effect: An Identified Group, or Just a Single Individual? | Tehila Kogut and Ilana Ritov | Journal of Behavioral Decision Making The "identified victim" effect: an identified group, or just a single individual?

Why are we more likely to offer help to a specific individual than a vague group? | The Decision Lab Identifiable Victim Effect - The Decision Lab